Interesting parallels

[photofly]

Your mate shouldn't accept legal advice from policemen. That's what lawyers are for.

[Shiny Side Up]

Anyone taking out a mortgage better make dam sure they know what they are getting into, and I'm afraid most of those Americans who jumped on sub-prime loans and lost their houses didn't.

I fully agree that people out there do have to be wiser and more responsible with their money. That being said though, we must accept the fact that we do have a significantly ignorant populace almost by design. After all, why aren't important things, life skills if you will, like how to file taxes, how to mortgage a house, qualifying for loans and how credit cards work, taught in our public schools? Just like how labour laws and worker's rights aren't taught. It all really sets up the general populace to be taken advantage of.

Lots of sell sell sell, but conspicuously absent was advice that although they would give it to me I couldn't really afford it. For that I had to rely on my own low tolerence for debt.

The vast majority of people are not all that financially adept and rely on investment advisors and banks to give them the straight goods, which as we know is not in the advisor's interest. They'll gleefully sell you crap investments because they make their money regardless of whether it goes up or down. They make money taking your money, not by making you better off.

My experience when applying for one as well. My best advice is to take someone who has experience for advice when you go - the older and more tight the relative the better. For example, the bank wants to give you a mortgage and will try to convince you to get the maximum ammount they can loan you - seems wierd - you'd think they would be a little more careful, until you realise how they want you to go about it. One of the things I was warned about was only give them as little info as they need to get exactly what you want for the mortgage/loan, you don't want them knowing what else they can come take from you. In all cases they were exceedingly agressive about it.

[Beefitarian]

Your mate shouldn't accept legal advice from policemen. That's what lawyers are for.

He never found the guitar but I'll bite. What would the lawyer do?

This should fit perfectly into the topic though because to me it sounds like you're suggesting if he could afford a lawyer instead of being a poor person he would be much better off.

[photofly]

It wasn't really meant to be "bait". But what your comment seems to suggest is that there's a general problem with proving the crime of theft (or burglary) "because someone can just claim "that money was owed" and "it's one person's word against another" in all cases. The particulars of your friend's case aside, I think that's very unlikely to be the case in general. I don't think theft is in all cases impossible to prove or that it's true that the police in general are dilatory or incompetent in investigating and prosecuting it. If that were the case it would take more than just your reporting of what your friend said a policeman once told him to convince me. And if the policeman told me that, I would investigate the true situation and take steps to make a complaint about him, too.

Unfortunately, if one can afford a lawyer then one is likely to be better off in all cases, including this one. That's a general feature of life, though.

[Beefitarian]

I'll tell you another anecdote regarding theft told to me again first hand by the person, in this case my wife's friend's husband. They own and run several gas stations and the police told them they must put all the petty theft including fuel, in to insurance claims. They are too busy to investigate and won't persue it even if you have perfect video footage including a license plate of the theft.

Don't worry though. Their company uses lawyers all the time in case you're going to bring up that nonsense up again, their fees and the cost of insurance priemiums go into the price of gas. The insurance company will get the money back for the guitar and everything else and continue to profit.

That's why insurance goes up in cost every year even if you are claim free. I guess you like paying more because of that sort of thing though.

[Wilbur]

I agree that personal finance should have been part of the school ciriculum a long time ago, and fortunately is now making it's way in. My kid is getting some financial planning in his grade 10 personal planning course, along with an introduction to OH&S rights. In fairness to the school systems, easy access to credit is a relatively recent phenomenon.

I absolutely agree that most bank staff are unqualified to be dispensing anything but the most basic advice. Most doing so were tellers who worked their way up, obtained a basic level personal financial planning accreditation and/or a licence to sell mutual funds. They dispense partially biased advice based on a formula which will result in you being directed into the products that bank deals in. Other investment and borrowing options, that may be better suited to your situation, won't be raised or discussed because the person talking to you probably doesn't know about or understand them.

All that said, a reasonable level of knowledge can be obtained fairly easily by reading a few books, going to a couple seminars, and reading the finanical pages. The problems is that the good advice will be telling people to save and invest a fixed % of their income and to avoid consumer debt, which is not what the large constinuency of impulsive, "I want it now," dopes want to hear; so they simply don't listen or make excuses for why they can't delay buying a bigger TV.

Dealing with a bank is no different than buying a product or service from any other business. People will spend countless hours researching the best smart phone deal they can get, even though they don't really need one, but almost completely ignore their finances. Overselling or selling a less than optimal product is not analgous to theft, and when someone defaults on a loan or mortgage, the bank loses money. It isn't up to the bank to decide what is best for you, its up to you.

[MUSKEG]

In the case of the stolen guitar i have a very simple solution that I have used and would use again. If you suspect you know the culprit, pay a visit carrying a bat. It is after all baseball season. You will accomplish a pleathera of things. 1) Most often your stuff will be offered back to you at no charge. 2) All those skilled pepole in the hospital will have work to do. 3) A lasting imprint on the brain of the perp to not do it again should result. 4) if #3 fails go back to step 1. After all it's your word against his right. Works both ways. Insurance is only good if you don't have a claim.

[Shiny Side Up]

Overselling or selling a less than optimal product is not analgous to theft,

But certainly selling a product you know is going to harm the customer is a different sort of heinous activity. Sort of like selling cigarettes to children. Its something that should definitely be more regulated, since it seems to be a pretty ambiguous ethical area.